Before Congress adjourned last week for recess, members worked out an agreement on student loans and the Senate approved a slew of Mr. Obama’s nominees, including Todd Jones at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and Samantha Power as ambassador to the United Nations.

Speaker John Boehner told reporters that while it’s not ideal, he wants to see another continuing resolution to temporarily fund the government in lieu of members coming to an agreement on the bigger picture issues. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said on “Fox News Sunday” there is “a great opportunity” this fall for lawmakers to work with the White House on entitlement reform. Still, lawmakers left unfinished any agreement about spending and debt and the farm bill. Not to mention a lack of progress on immigration reform legislation the president had long said he wanted on his desk this summer.

Just as they have for eons, members of the minority party criticized the break as members beat it out of town.

Rep. Steve Israel, D-N.Y., and chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, complained the GOP went home “skipping out on the American people for a five-week vacation without lifting a finger to fix the mess they have created,” and “leaving behind a wreck in Washington.”

Mr. Obama will likely offer a similar drumbeat as he keeps up his campaign-style appearances across the country. Tuesday he’ll focus on his plan to help homeowners while speaking in Phoenix before heading to Los Angeles to yuk it up with Jay Leno.

The Washington Post’s Matea Gold writes that just because lawmakers have managed to escape Washington, that does not mean they will be able to avoid interest groups eager to ramp up pressure on an array of pressing issues:

The sophisticated operations aim to drive a political narrative throughout the month, hoping to produce a strong display of voter sentiment that lawmakers will not be able to ignore when they return to Washington after Labor Day. At that point, they will immediately contend with a showdown over the budget, a House debate on immigration reform and the launch of new state health insurance marketplaces created by the Affordable Care Act.

So this month, the pressure is on. At town hall meetings, lawmakers will face activists calling for a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants. On walks in local neighborhoods, they could run into gun-control advocates, who plan to blanket key districts with fliers. During visits to the county fair, they are likely to encounter voters demanding defunding of President Obama’s signature health-care law.

The president’s allies are just starting to ramp up efforts to raise awareness of the October enrollment period for Obamacare. Over the weekend, volunteers across the country met with people in their community about the health care law, with varied success.

The NewsHour will be examining Washington’s gridlock over the next few weeks. Tune in.

Editor’s note: For the rest of the summer, the Morning Line will only publish once a week, on Mondays. Visit our home page for news and show segments, and follow @NewsHour for the latest.

LINE ITEMS

Lawmakers from both parties over the weekend said they agreed with the Obama administration’s decision to close two dozen diplomatic posts across the Middle East and North Africa because of a potential security threat.

Former GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum said Sunday that he would be open to running again in 2016. The former Pennsylvania senator will be in Iowa this week for a series of events, including a GOP fundraiser and the Family Leadership Summit.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and his Democratic challenger in the 2014 Kentucky Senate race, Alison Lundergan Grimes, traded insults Saturday at the annual Fancy Farm picnic. McConnell took a shot at Grimes’ father, a former state Democratic Party chairman, joking that he made a pitch for the women’s vote by sending Anthony Weiner a check. Grimes went after McConnell’s record of obstruction, saying that if doctors told the Republican he had a kidney stone, he would refuse to pass it.

Jonathan Martin of the New York Times finds that there is little support among the country’s Republican governors for shutting down the federal government as part of an effort to block funding for the president’s health care law.

Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley told reporters Saturday at the National Governors Association meeting that he is laying the “framework” for a potential 2016 presidential bid.

A green car firm connected to Democratic gubernatorial nominee Terry McAuliffe is under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission for its visa practices.

The wealthy donor at the heart of the probe into Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell is cooperating with authorities, the Washington Post reports.

David Brooks and Ruth Marcus analyzed the week’s political news and weighed in on the Pope’s comments about gays.

The Solman Scale “U7” — our more inclusive unemployment metric — ticked down to 16.15 percent, and business correspondent Paul Solman suggests baby boomer retirement may have something to do with it. He dug deeper into July’s unemployment numbers and a potentially slowing recovery on Friday’s broadcast.

Do zero-income-tax states know something the rest of us don’t? On the Business Desk, Reagan White House economist Arthur Laffer and Univeristy of Michigan tax economist Joel Slemrod debated the impact of eliminating state income taxes on states’ economic growth.